by UrMessage

Created on: October 06, 2010   Last Updated: June 01, 2012

Why Poker is not a Sport?

At least in my humble opinion

To keep things clear, I do not classify Poker as a sport because I believe there needs to be a division between knowledge skilled hobbies and physically demanding hobbies or sports. In addition, the primary definition of the noun "sport" as produced by Dictionary.com is the following: "an athletic activity requiring skill or physical prowess and often of a competitive nature, as racing, baseball, tennis, golf, bowling, wrestling, boxing, hunting, fishing, etc."

 - A link to the dictionary definition of "sport": http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/sport

I therefore classify Poker as "gaming" along with Chess, World of Warcraft (WOW) and any other type of online or offline game. It takes great skill to play poker well, just as with any other the other games I listed. If it doesn't take any real skill to play, that it is just a past time activity, such as walking. Any normal non-disabled human being can walk, it takes nothing more than what we were born into this world with, our feet and some form of muscles. Now, some taking walking to an olympic proportion, "power walking," and that takes skill and practice and hence I classify it as a sport.

Some might ask the question of, what skill does it take to play poker? For they classify poker as gambling, an addiction, a sin, or whatever else you feel like calling it. But here is the fact of the matter for anything, sport, games, life in general... Knowledge is the key to becoming successful. If you do not have a formal education in Finance or a similar background or have not taken the time to read and study and train yourself fully, than investing in the stock market is considered gambling. On the flip side, if you are super good with statistics, numbers, and card counting, than poker and similar card games are not risky and can become a job, for some it is.

So, to wrap everything up we have following three factors to determine whether it is a sport or a game: Mental Knowledge & Training, and Physical Skill & Ability. Mental Knowledge is whether you have been formally or informally trained in the subject matter and have a C+ knowledge level or above if you were to be tested. Physical Skills & Ability, is it something that you must physically train for, gain muscle mass, work at a gym and so forth. Lastly, if it lacks either of the two areas above, that it is a common past time like walking.

In the end, it does not really matter what we think, but what the fans and professionals of the different hobbies think. Many people consider fishing to be boring, but on the same scale, try watching a golf game on TV if you are not a fan and have little knowledge? You need to get out there and experience the different “games,” “hobbies,” "sports," and adventures, to really get a feel for them. In the end, you might find yourself a Poker King or a Bass trophy fishing champion, you really don't know until you step up to the plate and take the challenge.

Poker: a professional event, an activity, and to some - a sport. Thank you for your time, I hope that my blurb here helps enlighten and/or entertain your afternoon.

For more great tips and information, check out the following great website: AskMyMind.com

Have a wonderful day!

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